1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method for transmitting location information of a mobile communication terminal, and more particularly to a method for effectively transmitting location information, such that it allows a specific terminal to acquire its location information using a location information service, or allows the specific terminal to transmit its location information to another terminal.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
Generally, a mobile communication system provides a Location Based Service (LBS) capable of recognizing terminal location information based on a mobile communication network, and employing the recognized terminal location information. For example, a service (also called a positioning service) for tracking a human location or an object location, a vehicle navigation service, and an emergency rescue service, etc., have been widely used as the above-mentioned LBS.
A current mobile communication system generally provides the above-mentioned LBS service via a control plane of a network system. However, the LBS service implemented via the control plane of the network system employs different positioning-signaling functions and different positioning systems according to network structures (e.g., a 3GPP (3rd Generation Partnership Project) and a 3GPP2 (3rd Generation Partnership Project 2).
Therefore, in order to update the service or introduce a new positioning method into the network, the above-mentioned mobile communication system must update or newly introduce all network components, that should be changed to others because a signaling and a protocol of the control plane have been changed, resulting in greater inconvenience of use.
A User Plane Protocol capable of enabling a User Plane to provide a location information service has been defined to solve the above-mentioned problems.
The User Plane Protocol has been designed to transmit specific information required for the positioning service using the User Plane, such that it is independent of the network structure. Also, the User Plane Protocol need not update all network components of the positioning system on the condition that the service is updated or a new positioning method is introduced.
However, the above-mentioned User Plane Protocol does not describe a method for allowing a specific terminal to receive its location information or a method for allowing the specific terminal to transmit its location information to another terminal, such that unexpected problems occur in a positioning process.